There is no paucity of surfactants for use in detergent compositions per se. However, even the most widely used detergents for home laundry use, linear alkyl-benzene sulfonates (LABS) or alcohol ethoxylates (AEO) have shortcomings. For example, the ethoxylated alcohols are relatively costly compared to their precursor alcohols and, while effective against soiled synthetics, are comparatively poor for the laundering of cellulosics such as cotton. Good activity against cellulosics such as cotton is still important even with the increasing use of synthetics because cellulosics are the most widely used fabric in garment manufacture. In addition, the cellulosics can be readily dyed, they are durable and, since they "breathe", they are comfortable to wear. The LABS formulations are relatively poor in removing soil in cellulosics and are only slowly biodegradable in the soil. Until this invention, there was a need for a low cost, readily available, surfactant with good laundering activity against cotton and other cellulosics, possessing low mammalian toxicity and which is readily biodegraded by microorganisms in the soil.
Recently the applicants have discovered that not only are certain alkanols active as surfactants, but that certain aspects of this surfactant activity are both unexpected and unobvious because:
(1) The linear or branched fatty alcohols (also known as paraffinic alcohols or alkanols) are relatively insoluble in the water environment in which they are used;
(2) It has been found that there is a substantial dropping off of their surfactant activity in the fatty alcohols containing less than 7 carbon atoms and those above 16 carbon atoms;
(3) The surfactant activity of these alkanols is quite specific for cotton fabrics as opposed to synthetic fabrics such as nylon, dacron etc.;
(4) When these active alkanols are optionally formulated with finely divided, chemically non-reactive inorganic powders passing through a 325 mesh screen having a surface area of at least 30 M.sup.2 /g in addition to conventional builders, the flowability of the formulations is greatly improved and detergency in standard laundering tests is improved.